April Showers! A Good Day for Bluebirds, Sand Hill Cranes, Geese, and Snickerdoodles!

Hi all my friends in bloggy land!  It seems like I don't get to visit with you as much lately. Mommie says it's all her fault because she hasn't been taking me on as many adventures as before, and she says she apologizes!  But today we tried to make up for it!  It's the 2nd day of April, and it's been raining almost all day!!  Mommie said April is living up to its reputation of "April showers brings May flowers!" 

Well, this picture on the calendar says, "A Good Day for Ducks"

(John Sloane, artist, Country Seasons Calendar)

Mommie said it is a good day for ducks here at our own Still Waters Pond.  We don't have very many ducks...but we do have geese, Sand Hill Cranes, and Bluebirds!

I wanted to go outside and see the raindrops and also see what I could see on or around the pond. So I put on my rain poncho that Mommie's friend "Auntie Pamela" made for me last spring, and we went out on the back porch to see what we could see.

If you look really really closely at the birdhouse, you will see Mama Bluebird sticking her head out to look at me!! I guess she was just as curious about me as I was about her!! She poked her head out for a second or two,  and then...

when I looked again, she was gone!!! She flew away to the nearest tree, even though it was pouring down rain!  I hope I didn't scare her! Mommie said most likely she just needed to go get some more food for her babies, because she and Papa Bluebird have been very busy lately feeding the babies!

Oh lookie! There's Papa Bluebird now! And he's got a juicy bug or something to feed to his hungry little family in the house!!

Mommie said the Bluebirds take really good care of their babies!  She said God created them and gave them "instincts" so they would know just what to do to take care of their babies and each other.

And lookie here! There's another family taking care of its baby!  Mommie said she told you about the new baby Sand Hill Crane "Colt" HERE yesterday.  Well, this morning, before it started raining it got really really dark in the skies and was kind of scary. But when we looked outside we could see the Crane family way over on the little marsh island in the pond, and they had their baby Colt right there with them!

They were all walking around on that marshy little island poking their long beaks in the ground looking for food, and showing the baby how to hunt for his own food too.

Can you see him? Isn't he sweet?  I just love him so much!

Well, then the big thunderstorm broke loose, and there was lightning and thunder and lots and lots of rain! And the sky was really really dark.  I was scared and worried about the baby Colt, but Mommie said that Jesus was taking care of us, and He would also take care of the Colt and his parents out there on that little island.

Mommie said the mother crane was sitting on top of the baby, keeping him safe and dry under her wings.  She said the camera doesn't do a very good job of taking a picture so far away when it is dark and rainy like that, so please don't mind that these pictures are so blurry.

Mommie said this reminds her this Bible verse:

Psalm 91:4

"He (God) shall cover you with His feathers,

And under His wings you shall take refuge;"

Oh, the Sand Hill Cranes and the Bluebirds weren't the only ones out in the rain. Here are some of our Canada Geese swimming around the pond in the rain.  Mommie said it doesn't bother them because they live in the water most of the time anyway, and God created them to be in the water, so they, like ducks, are quite happy in the rain. 

Well, after all that, we came inside and decided to bake some cookies. Mommie says rainy days are good days to do some baking and make the house smell good with yummy things to eat!

Mommie said that today we would bake some "Snickerdoodle cookies!" 

"Snickerdoodles?" I asked.  "What kind of cookies are those?"  Mommie said they are really delicious cinnamon and sugar cookies, and that Daddy and my big brother Scott really love them,  and she thinks I will too.

Here's the recipe in case you are wondering what Snickerdoodles are too!

So here I am helping mix up the Snickerdoodles.  

And then Mommie said we had to roll the dough into little balls like the size of a walnut, and then we have to roll the ball in a dish of cinnamon and sugar:

I tried my best to help. It was a lot of fun!!!

And then I got to lick the beater!!!!!  Mommie said that she always got to lick the beater when she was a little girl, and that it never made her sick. And she said her three sons always got to lick the beater when they were little, and it never made them sick, and so I should also get to lick the beater, and she's quite sure it won't make me sick either!  Yummy! It was good!!!!

After a few minutes the hot cookies came out of the oven!  I had to wait a few minutes before I could taste one because they were too hot.

But when they were cool enough, Mommie let me take a bite, and WOW!! Those Snickerdoodles sure are delicious!!!!!

Oh, and then my big brother Scotty came out of his room (he's off from work today), and he tried one of the snickerdoodles, and he said, "WOW!"

 "These sure are GOOD!!"  I think he had to taste a few more just to be certain. At least that's what he said!

I asked Mommie if my puppy Bailey and I could have a little tea party and have some snickerdoodles.

She said sure, but that Bailey wasn't allowed to eat a cookie because she shouldn't have sugar.

So we got Bailey some of her special doggy cookies for her treat. She was happy about that!

And lookie! Her plate has a picture of Buster Brown and his doggy on it too, having a tea party!

The dishes we used for our tea party were my Grandma Mursch's Buster Brown Tea Set, which actually originally belonged to my mommie's Aunt Margie, who was Grandma's big sister. She said these dishes are very very old and special and we must be very careful not to break them. So we were careful, and we had a very nice little tea party.

Bailey loved her dog cookies, and I loved my snickerdoodle!

Well, it is still raining. And Mommie says it is time for us to quit writing and go cook supper. Maybe I can help?

Thank you for visiting with me on this rainy day. I hope wherever you are that you are safe and happy and warm.

Mommie said that this month we will celebrate Easter! I am very excited about that! And I am so happy that Jesus loved me enough to die on the cross for my sins, and that He rose again from the grave to show us how to find everlasting life!

I hope you are excited about that Good News too!!

Bye bye for now.

Love,

Lily Grace and Bailey

xoxoxoxoxo

Friday Foto Friends, It's Me again!!

 Hi friends!! It's been a while since I visited with you. Mommie says to tell you it's all her fault! She's been busy with other things or wasn't feeling well, and so I haven't been able to go on very many "adventures" lately.  But since Mommie didn't have anything special to share today for Friday Foto Friends, she said I could do it for her.  So here we go!!

Yesterday morning Mommie baked some yummy delicious blueberry-bran muffins!!

I asked her if we could have a little tea party to celebrate! So Mommie said that would be fun!

She brought out her little Madame Alexander dolls, Miss Ireland and Miss Scotland, and we are all dressed up in anticipation of St. Patrick's Day coming on March 17th!  

My puppy Bailey wanted to join us too!

Oh, and the "fairies" were welcome too!

Oh, lookie! Strawberries!! They are so sweet and juicy and good right now!!

I told Mommie that the fairies needed some little teacups so they could have tea too, so she found this tiny little tea set just for them.

As you can see, we had a lovely tea party and a good time was had by all!!

OH, I wanted to show you these pretty Goldfinches who have been visiting our yard lately:

Mommie said this is a male Goldfinch, and he loves that niger seed that is in that sock!

Isn't he beautiful?

And Mommie thinks these are female Goldfinch. There have been lots and lots of them, but they seem to eat seeds on the ground, so she isn't sure if that is what they are or not, but they are pretty too!

Okay, and here's my last pictures. This is my Daddy! Isn't he handsome?  Well, Mommie sure thinks so. She took this picture of him the other day while they were on a walk. Mommie said she had never seen that shirt before...apparently it was a Christmas gift from his brother and sister in law, but with all the commotion on Christmas Mommie said she never saw it when he opened it!

And Mommie said she liked it so well she wished she had one like it too! But anyway, she said I could share it with you. 

Mommie said, "Life IS good", and we are very thankful for all that God has done for us. We are praying for the people of Ukraine especially right now, because they are under attack  by a fierce enemy, and they really need God's help to survive.  So we are praying for them every day.

Mommie is going to go help my big brother Benton at their store in St. Augustine today...

"Dixie Cottage"

That's my big brother Benton and Auntie Rose now. This was taken last year, almost exactly one year ago, when they opened the doors for their store for the first time!

They stay very very busy and need lots of help, so Mommie says she will go and help out today.

So, that's it for today, friends!

I hope you enjoyed this little "adventure" with me!

Love,

Lily Grace

xoxoxoxox

Friday Foto Friends with Lily Grace

Hi Everyone! Mommie said I could post my own favorite pictures for the week here on my page since she did hers over on her page, Closed Doors, Open Windows.   I saw some interesting things this past week too that are different from what Mommie saw, so here are MY pictures!!

One day when we came back from our walk, I noticed something purple sticking up out of the ground under the big oak trees in our front yard.  Since I really like the color purple, I wanted to see what this could be:

Mommie said it was some kind of mushroom, and she'd never seen a purple one before!

After looking it up online, she thinks it is called a Cortinarius Iodes kind of mushroom.  She doesn't know if it is toxic or not, but she said not to touch it or try to eat it...

There were a lot of them popping up all under the oak trees in the thick piles of old oak leaves and acorns.

Looky at this one! It is all ruffles and looks like some kind of flower! Isn't it pretty?

There so many of them in all different shapes and stages of growth...I thought they were really really pretty and interesting!

Wow! Look at this one!! It looks like it is turning inside out or something like that!

And these two are like twins!!! They are just coming up through the leaves and they are stuck together:

This one is showing its under side and the light is shining through it. I really loved seeing these mushrooms, didn't you?

Oh, look! Another one!! No, there's two again!!  Mommie said I would make a good botanist or something like that... a person who likes to study flowers and leaves and trees and mushrooms and stuff! Maybe I will be that when I grow up! It sounds like fun to me! I love being in the woods!

And speaking of woods, while we were outside looking at the mushrooms, this big truck drove by our house with a bunch of tree logs piled up on it!

Mommie said it was unusual to see them driving through our neighborhood, and that they must have cut these off of some property back in the woods somewhere and they are taking them to the pulp mill.

They sure were big long tree trunks! It makes me sad to see them all cut down like that, but Mommie said there will be more trees planted and growing again, and they use trees like this to make paper and toilet paper and all kinds of things, so it isn't all bad.

Speaking of trees, we went on our back porch and I saw this yellow powdery stuff all over our tables and chairs. Mommie said it was pollen and that it blew out of the trees and onto our porch when the wind was blowing and then when we had a big bad thunderstorm the rain blew in and made it all smeary on the tables and stuff.

It sure was yucky, and you couldn't sit down on the chairs or you would get it all over your clothes. Mommie said the pollen also makes people sneeze and have stuffy noses and watery eyes and allergies and stuff.  But she said the pollen is necessary for the trees to keep living. It comes from the little tiny flowers or leaf buds that grow on the trees in the spring, and without the pollen they wouldn't keep growing every year.   So I guess it isn't all bad either.  

But Mommie said we could have some fun and squirt the hose on the tables and chairs and deck and clean all the pollen off.  She let me hold the hose and pull the trigger so the water would come out and wash off the pollen!  That was a lot of fun, and soon our tables and chairs were all pretty and clean again...Mommie said until the next bunch of pollen blows out of the trees again...

Oh, one other thing we did this week was watch some of the "Maine Cabin Masters" shows on TV! Mommie loves to watch them restore cabins and cottages and stuff in the special woods and lakes of Maine.  She said that they used to live in Maine, and that my "nephew" Noah still lives there! "Nephew?"  Yes, because he is my big brother Matthew's son, so that makes him a "nephew", but he is 21 years old and much much bigger than me.  Anyway, I hope I get to see him sometime, but Maine is far far away from Florida so I don't know when it will be. But anyway, we watched Maine Cabin Masters on TV. Mommie likes to listen to the people talk because they sound like people she knew in Maine. They talk kind of different than people in Florida.  Maybe we'll go visit sometime so I can see for myself.  

And then something else special happened.  Mommie is cleaning up the Valentine's stuff and putting away things that have been sitting out for a while. So she said it was time to put away the "Martin Sisters", remember them? Those pretty four ladies that had me visit for tea?  Well, Mommie said they are special friends who visit in the winter time, but now it was time to bring out some other special friends who visit in the spring time.  She calls these the Southern Belles.  Aren't they beautiful? 

Well, Mommie said I had to dress up a little nicer to have tea time with the Southern Belles, but I didn't have any other pretty dress besides my Valentine's Dress.  So she asked my friend Margie doll if I could borrow one of her special dresses for the day...and Margie said that would be fine.

It fits me perfectly, don't you think? I love it! Mommie said that her Mommy (Dorothea!) made this dress especially for Margie (see below)

I am happy that it fits me too, and that Margie was willing to let me borrow it for this special occasion.

And so the Southern Belles all seemed pleased to meet me and they said I could come back and visit any time.

Well, I guess that's all of my special pictures for this week. It's been raining all day, so we haven't been able to go outside at all. But it's fun to play indoors and find other special things to do on a rainy day!

Mommie said it is a good day to read some good books. And this one, "A Child's Garden of Verses" by Robert Louis Stevenson, was one of Mommie's special books when she was a little girl like me!

It is full of special poems that Mr. Stevenson wrote just for children.  Mommie said "The Swing" was one of her favorites:

"How do you like to go up in a swing,

Up in the air so blue?

Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing

Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,

Till I can see so wide,

Rivers and trees and cattle and all

Over the countryside...

Till I look down on the garden green,

Down on the roof so brown...

Up in the air I go flying again,

Up in the air and down!"

And then I read some of the poems to the teddy bears, and they really liked it a lot!

Now, here's a "Happy Thought"

"The world is so full of a number of things,

I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings."

And so I will leave us with that "Happy Thought".

Until next time,

Love always,

Lily Grace

xoxoxo